I was at the grocery store Wednesday and, while inside, my turbo lines finally decided to give up. (2014 E63 S with 68000 miles)

I'd been expecting this and had the parts in my Amazon shopping cart... but I didn't buy them. That was dumb. If you have more than ~8 years and more than 65k on your M157 with original lines. Buy those lines and the other stuff. Now.

Part numbers:
- Left feed and return lines (278-200-13-00, 278-200-09-00)
- Weirdo third line to tie in the right turbo to the water loop (157-200-00-00 also made of plastic. This will shatter when you touch or or look at it or think about it)
- Water pump (157-200-02-01-80 - yes, do this too... you don't want to go in there again for a while and the bearing is probably shot even if the belt hasn't started walking off the pulley yet )
- Thermostat (278-200-06-15 - the old one will break off in the pump)
- V-belt (003-993-47-96) Beware - the auto stores will sell you one that's about 2539mm long. This is not the right length, which I didn't learn until attempting to install it (yes, I should have compared them before trying... duh). There were none in stock of the right size at my dealer... so I had to use the old one again.
- The right (passenger) lines are not dip**** plastic, so they're fine.

Note:
- Underneath one of the lines you're replacing, where it mounts to the water pump, there are two holes. On my original pump, these were plugged and it will make sense why when you see how the line mounts (without them this will leak. Guaranteed). Make sure you have these on the new pump or extract them from the old one. You'll see on the engine-side of the pump there is some weird afterthought of a metal cover which hides the internal side of these plugs. It clearly wasn't part of the original casting of the part, and is weakly attached. I used a large screwdriver inserted into the water channel to pry/break this off and then a socket to drive the plugs out... worked like a charm. Otherwise you will probably destroy them if you attempt to pull them out with pliers or something. You need these plugs and I'm not sure you can buy them.

Other stuff:
- Coolant, obviously. I bought concentrate, but wish I'd bought pre-mix... still not sure why I did that.
- Silicone lube... it will make things soooo much easier.
- Assorted band clamps. I had to replace one of the permanent ones with a band clamp as it released part of the hose if was holding.
- Low-profile 8mm socket and wrench. You will need this when it comes to getting the lines out of the turbo, (https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/c...profile&pos=10 and https://www.oreillyauto.com/detail/c...cket+set&pos=7)
- Magnetic grabber
- Torx male and female sets
- Plenty of extensions and u-joint attachments
- One of those 90-degree drivers (

Amazon

Amazon

)
- a short 8mm bit for that driver... or cut one in half like I had to

Things to do that I wish I had known ahead of time
- Be very careful with the 8mm bolt holding the lines to the turbo... these bolts don't need a lot of torque... just imagine what you'll have to do if you break the head off... that looks like an engine-out to me.
- Remove the fan. Do this first. If you don't, you will just cut yourself, curse, then remove it later. It has 3 torx screws on the bottom that are holding oil cooler lines which must come off, as well as a few connectors. 2 of these torx screws are relatively easy to remove. One of them, the one on the passenger side, requires a miracle. I also loosened the metal plate between the headlights (but did not remove it) and this made the fan easier to extract. There are videos about how to do this on the W212, but the AMG variant is a little different.
- Remove both charge pipes on the left (driver) side. If you've never done this before, it's a PITA but just keep wiggling the the low-pressure side should come off. I sprayed silicone spray on the lower rubber flange thing to help it move. The high pressure side is much nicer and straightforward.
- Remove the idler pulley above the AC compressor. You'll need this room for the turbo lines and its easy to put back
- When you're putting the low-pressure side back on, do it before replacing the fan AND put the rubber sleeve that comes off with the pipe on the turbo first, then slide the pipe flange over the rubber sleeve.... If you try to push the flange with the rubber sleeve on the turbo intake (i.e. the way it came off) well... good luck. Film it so the rest of us can laugh later on.
- The casting on my pump sucked when it came to the threaded holes for the idler pulley and mounting brackets that bold to the housing. I fought through it, but consider using a tap to clean them up a bit
- Use the 90-degree and short 8mm bit to extract the impossible-to-reach bolt from the coolant lines heading to the turbo... although I can't recall if I had removed the fan yet when I did this, so maybe you'll have more luck
- I don't have many tips for pulling the old lines out of the turbo... maybe just that I dribbled silicone lube on them from above and gave it some time to soak in. They're a pain to extract.
- There's another bracket which holds both lines together, sandwich style. I did not find a way to remove this. Since my lines were broken anyway, I just bent the **** out of them to get them out of the engine bay. I did not re-install the sandwich-bracket.
- Routing the new lines to the turbo is going to drive you crazy. I unbolted the oil feed lines near the filter housing to try and move as many things out of the way. My only tip is: DO NOT insert either one of them into the turbo until both of them are ready to be inserted and (a bit more obvious) DO NOT bolt the other end of either of them to the water pump until both are ready
- Dont hesitate to use silicone on the main water line connections... the o-rings on the hose connecting to new thermostat would NOT lock in without this.

I'll edit if I recall more details. I hope this helps someone. It was about 2x harder than it needed to be because of the above.

I also hope Mercedes pulls their head out and makes a metal version of these parts. There is no reason for them to be like this.... except for shop hours, of course.

 

I very much appreciate your post! I replaced WP, stat, turbo lines, belt, pulleys etc etc on my m278 coupe last year and it was quite the undertaking. I didn’t take good notes like this above and wish I did! You may save me a few hours of cursing and bloody knuckles.

Took a while before I realized I actually had the coolant lines fully seated into the turbo…they don’t sit flush (flange to turbo) like I thought they did and it drove me nuts.

 

Nice: will add to the sticky; any pics?

 

Thanks!

I have a few pics, but not enough to paint the kind of picture that would help... If there are questions answered by any pics I have, I will post them

 

That is almost the exact mileage my 2014 had when a line exploded last year after parking it at work, go figure!

 

Yeah, this is the mileage when the go. If nothing else, this means the engineering is very consistent with these parts.

But, there is no reason at all for the parts in question to have been made of plastic. The connections aren't that complex and there's room for larger pipes... the should be entirely metal or rubber with metal connections. It's very disappointing that they continue with this trash. I'm surprised someone else hasn't come up with something here... maybe there's just not enough M278/M157s out there to make it worth the engineering cost.

 

Engineered obsolescence - why make it last into the post warranty phase of the engine's life? If it don't make dollaz don't make [sense].

 

There is that upgrade post in the sticky…using rubber tubing in place of the plastic. I wonder if that proved out long-term…?

 

Yeah, I saw that... but it doesn't address the plastic connection to the pump. If these fail again, I may try to do the update in place and leave the turbo lines attached. If you don't have to replace the turbo end, this job gets MUCH easier

 

This is the upgrade post, for future readers
https://mbworld.org/forums/w212-amg/...e-upgrade.html

 

Here's why I think the upgrade is 1) awesome and 2) not good enough

In the photo, you can see where the plastic lines fail, with the upgraded line, and the original part. The problem is that the failure point is at the connection to the manifold -- not the plastic hose piece that is being upgraded in the post.

If I were to do this again, I would clip off the ridged nipple in the "this is what is being connected to" portion, and replace it with a thin aluminum pipe, epoxied in place. The portion under the yellow (nipple with o-rings) might still degrade and become brittle, but it should essentially last forever unless it's disturbed,

I'd take this approach for the other connector as well. As for the third "weirdo" pipe I mention above, I think it might be beyond help. I'll give it more thought.

 

Here's the weirdo part with failure points... something similar to what is above could be done probably, but it'd be more difficult

 

I will do this next time:
- Replace the water pump and thermostat (this implies the belt removal as well as the driver-side low-pressure charge pipe and fan removal)
- Leave the metal portion of the old, installed turbo lines in place
- Cut off the plastic hose of the failed lines, leaving the aluminum portion of the turbo lines
- Buy the three new coolant lines/pipes - separate the hoses/aluminum pipes from the connection pieces
- (maybe?) Cut off the plastic tube connections on the new connection pieces and epoxy in aluminum tubes for rubber lines to connect to
- Replace the plastic tube portions with rubber tubing, which will now connect to the new aluminum endpoint on one end, and the old line going to the turbo on the other end.

(if someone were 'cheap' enough, they might even be able to do this without new parts... assuming they could extract the o-ring nipples from the water pump without breaking them off)

Maybe leave the plastic barbed nipple on the new connection if the epoxy/aluminum idea wont fly. Considering that the water pump only lasts 70k anyway, you'll need to extract/replace these connections anyway at their approximate failure interval... But, the advantage of making sure these joints don't fail is that YOU get to decide when it's time to change them with the water pump instead of letting entropy handle it... leaving you with a possibly overheated engine on the side of a highway.

Personally I'd rather just check the pump bearing now and then and choose when to change these rather than just waiting for my car to need a tow in God-knows-what circumstance.

Also, this will make it so you don't have to deal with a massive problem that comes with this repair - removing/routing the old turbo lines. I bet this job could be done in a few hours without dealing with the turbo line connection portion. The only down side is that you'll have to pay better attention to the health of the water pump since you wont have the plastic parts breaking to tell you when its gone bad.

 

Update - I returned the water pump today for a core and asked about the plugs I mentioned that I had to knock out of the old pump. I wasn't sure in my OP, but the parts guy says they do sell them. So make sure you get some. The old ones might work but they looked sketchy to me. I forgot to ask for price, but I bet they're cheap.

Also, there's a bleeder pipe that comes up from the timing cover and goes to the main reservoir (as well as the radiator). I removed this so it would not get broken as I engaged in combat with the other parts on the engine. When I removed it, the portion of the hose that connects to the timing cover (278-203-12-17) has a plastic nipple thing that inserts into the timing cover which broke off. The break was so clean that I didn't notice there was a problem. I used some reinzosil (a-la M539 restorations) as I reassembled everything, not realizing until the next day that part of this line had actually snapped off... and it's basically working. But, it's not perfect and weeps a drop or two. The nipples are $4. Buy some and replace it while the system is empty if you mess with this line.

 

Haha…yup that same line broke on me in same manner! Unfortunately (maybe) I paid full price for the replacement line (?$80)…I know it comes up as one of the most frequently ordered parts for our cars on FCP. Its almost funny to scroll through that list sorted that way…I’ve bought one of each for sure at this point

 

Well, what I’d feared would happen happened - bolt head securing the coolant lines to the driver side turbo snapped. Tried turning it out with small pair of vice grips and long needle nose pliers, big no go of course. See photos below of my predicament, bolt threads appear yellow because I applied a bit of paint to see whether I was actually turning it with the pliers.

Any ideas from your experiences? I don’t have access to an oxy/acetylene torch, only propane. And no, engine-out isn’t an option either. Thank you

 

Oof... that sucks. I'd been turning this over in my head in case I was close enough to over-torquing mine so that the heat-cycles eventually pop it off.

All I could think of would be dribbling penetrating oil on it, waiting, then a long set of needle-nose pliers... even 1-degree rotation per minute would be acceptable in my imagination -- It sounds like you've arrived at my nightmare scenario...

I have some long needle nose from harbor freight, and they're very "springy" so it's hard to apply serious pressure at the clamp end. So, 1) don't underestimate the effect of penetrating oil and 2) spend some money on high-quality pliers. Once it moves even a little, you should be home-free with enough time.

 

Yep, oil and long, thin channel lock pliers set to a very tight setting. Or, metal jb-weld a nut on the end and try again.

 

Another thought looking at your pictures. It looks like you've smooshed the threads to a flat area, which should make it easier to turn... I wonder if you got a small file down there to flatten it just a little more it would create a good landing for the pliers. Risky to remove protruding material, but might work.

As a final option, turbos have to be swapped out now and then, so you might call a shop and see if they can do a turbo change without an engine out. Maybe there's a way to do it that they'll share.

 

Any luck?

To break that head off is super easy for anyone to do... if you find a way out, you're a pioneer and should get a medal of freedom or something.

 

Haven’t tried yet…. combination of dread, fear, and laziness (and allowing plenty of time for the PB Blaster to soak in). But will be hitting it this weekend.

Happy Thanksgiving everyone

 

I know the space is tight but you should try heat with any extraction method. Maybe you can rent an induction heater, or use a small handheld torch like is used for soldering. Heat expands the metal so you want to hit the turbo, not the bolt. Even if you can’t get it as hot as you need, it will allow the penetrating oil to enter the threads. Do whatever you can to prepare before possibly breaking the rest of those exposed threads off. I might even tap it a bit to shock the rust while it’s hot. Good luck because space is tight and very few tools are long and thin enough to approach it from the top.

 

Speaking of plastic, The genuine remanufactured water pump comes a plastic pulley. I see there is one made by Febi/Bilstein that has a metal pulley - has anyone tried this pump? Edit: Found a couple reviews that say use genuine...

 

Hoping that these bad boys may help get me out of my jam. If not, plan on heating the turbo for an extended period with a propane torch to help get the bolt free.

 

File 2 flat surfaces and use wrench to finagle it out.